Review Round 4, 2017 - Brisbane Lions vs. Richmond

[Skoob]

What is very obvious, and the coaches will kick themselves for not seeing the simplicity earlier, is that Fagan needs to give his half time spray, before the game.

 

[Crawb]

From memory he didn't leave he got sacked and the coach isn't responsible for recruiting. So no use in blaming leppitsch. The whole club is responsible for the predicament we are in, which in my veiw is much better then last year.

Was responsible for stagnating player development since 2014 though. Your right though, it is the club's fault for even putting another "favourite son" into the role. But regardless my point still stands - we're still a long way back from being a decent team.

 

[deklares]

I think Hipwood would be well served by marking an experienced forward a couple of times this year as part of his apprenticeship. For someone with his athleticism doesn't seem to be using it the last couple of weeks. Does he feel he needs to take a back seat now that Scahche's back? Not sure. He is not built for the man on man wrestling just yet so planting his feet and tussling with the backmen is not playing to his strengths. Not too many 200cm backmen will be able to go with his running and repeat efforts if he just got on his bike more often. Both Schache and Hipwood should be working up the wings to provide a get out mark out of our back 50 with Close staying in the forward 50.

Also I think the fine line of getting as much game time into our 1st/2nd year players whilst not burning them out (Schache last year) needs to be walked. We need to lift the level of the mid range of our list and this is the quickest way to do it. I think although guys like McLuggage may look out of their depth physically he may well be able to work around that with the footy smarts and quick hands that he showed at u/18 level with a bit of belief in himself gained by more time to find his feet at this level. I would however be giving Clugga, Berry and Cox rest at the first sign of the bash and crash taking it's toll.

 

[Milux]

Just finished watching the game.

Darcy Gardiner. Super effory all night. Made some mistakes. Probably career best game for him.

Mcstay. Didnt fade out like always. Stayed in the game all night so we can't fault his endeavor. Lacked polish and some knowledge but confident he can overcome that.

Hipwood. Barely sighted all night. I beleive he needs a week off.

Schache. Not overly impressed with his effort. Found some space but rarely capitalized. Too soft for rucking.

Bell. Went missing too often. Poor ball user.

Rockliff/D Beams. Both prolific. Good midfield games by both.

Martin. Beast around the middle.

C Beams. Ok first game back. Should get a few games to get going.

Lugs/Berry/Cox. Typical young fellas games. Mistakes and missed tackles but cant fault their effort. All retain their spot for mine.

D Rich. Another typical D Rich game.

Bad bits. Cutlers hammy. Poor ball use. Lack of agro.

Good bits. We can see the game plan. And when we execute it by foot with out panicking it comes off and it comes off well.

Obvious out for mine is Bewick. Unfortunately hasn't been able to bring his JLT form into the season proper consistently.

 

[Milux]

Sorry for the long post.^^

 

[jackess]

Sorry for the long post.^^

Seemed pretty accurate but lacked polish is probably a huge understatement for McStay last night.

 

[Fitzroy bears]

Was responsible for stagnating player development since 2014 though. Your right though, it is the club's fault for even putting another "favourite son" into the role. But regardless my point still stands - we're still a long way back from being a decent team.

You are entitled to that opinion, but I don't believe he was responsible for the" stagnation" of development. The list was transitioned through the bulk of leppitschs' tenure, cut to the bone some would say. I would say leppitschs' failure was the ability(lack of experience ) to create a game plan that suited the talent or lack thereof to sustain hope and belief within the group, eventually leading to his demise. That is just my opinion.

 

[Tassie4ever]

Haven't commented too much this season as it's obvious that Fagan is working his way through the list to work out who is worth persevering with and so ups and downs are to be expected.

Which brings me to last night. I was, was, in the camp that thought we were on the improve- gradual, granted, but discernible.

Not any more. We are where we were for the last few years. Nowhere. Absolutely nowhere. We have a group that is by and large never going to make it. Take out Beams D, Zorko, Martin, Robinson and what are we left with? Bugger all. By the time we have assembled a competitive side they'll all be long gone.

Put it another way- who is going to finish behind us this season. Realistically, Carlton is the only contender.

Take one example, but by no means the only one: I watched Bewick closely from the wing last night. Wherever he played, we had a soft spot. He was never going to be a hard, in and at it type, but he has gone backwards. Last season, to generally negative feedback, I said that whether or not Bewick was getting a game was a barometer of our team's progress. He is still getting a game. Same with that "team leader" Lester. And what about MacStay- what a revelation. Not.

TBH, with the above exceptions, you could go through the list with many of the same comments. But why bother. And what is it with dropping simple chest marks? Do we coach for this?

The only bright spot for me last night was Cox. Too light right now, but obviously great potential.

Very depressing.

 

[Kernel Kurtz]

I think we have blooded too many young players too quickly .
Not sure it helps with their confidence at all .
Our core of senior players are going well , but how long can they keep carrying the team .
Hopefully Fagan has a long term plan .
Hipwood and Schache are just too young to share the key forward positions at the moment .
They need time .and a more mature body to fill in .

Makes you wonder why Close was taken out of the side, was it just because of those dropped marks.
For what is worth I think Frost did a reasonable job when in. It also does what Close does to our forward set up , loosens other players up.
Andrews took what 1 intercept mark , more than likely he had more , not his normal game .
McStay keep him out of the back line please.
Next week based on this week and last week and the Bombers game

Out : McStay In : Close - better set up with Hippy and Schache.
Out : Cutler (injured and poor form) In : Frost - better set up with Andrews.
Out : Either Berry too green picked too early or Claye- not up to it. In : Harwood or Dawson
Out : Bell In : Christo

Possible outs.

N. Robbo In Harwood or Dawson
Bewick In Paps
Umpires that don't call incorrect disposal.

 

[Fitzroy bears]

We are a better team than last year, of that I have no doubt. That would have been a hundred point loss easily last year. The progress has come in many small ways and is still slow and patchy.

I think the first thing that Fagan has done, and done well, is getting the most senior players to lift and play well. I felt that last night was evidence of that - DBeams, Rich, Rockliff, Zorks, Martin, MRobbo all led the way. They lead by their actions on the field. Of the next group coming through, Taylor, Mayes and Andrews are also solid contributors now.

So we are building up a core of players who have higher expectations on them and are starting to meet those expectations. The younger players still have a way to go - quite a long way. We are showing more signs but, as Fagan hinted at, there is a lot of caution and self-preservation in what we still do.

The challenge for Fagan and the coaches now is to get the players believing that the plan will work and that they need to take calculated risks. I think we are going to have to suffer more of these kinds of losses to move forward. This was a game where we were better than them in some aspects of the game but not enough to change the scoreboard, and we deserved what we got. We really do need to have the mindset that we might go down losing games because we tried things. But gradually I think the gap between our best and worst will close. At our best, I think we could outplay any team, which is true of every other club too. The better teams just have a smaller gap between their good and bad and produce much more good than bad. Our worst is truly awful. Our best is truly awesome. Close the gap by improving each little thing we do and we will make progress.

We have a lot of damage to undo from the last few years. I think the senior players have worked through that the quickest and now the next group need to step up and show improvement. The first and second year players are going to take the longest to come around. I actually think that Fagan is connecting well with the players and he mentioned that they are a very coachable group. It is just a case of increments of improvement and weeding out those who can't or won't make the progress.

Totally agree the difference between us and say the crows, the crows have pace and experience across the ground to account for any mistakes made through their ball movement. We have slow personnel (not their fault) and we make skill errors early in our ball movement which causes scores against. Skill will come and I am sure our recruiters are hunting pace for the midfield, but it will take time

 

[Fitzroy bears]

Think the knock on bewick and c.beams is a bit harsh.
Bewick had 18 disposals 7 marks and 4 tackles i would say a majority of those marks were intercepts.
C.beams had 17 disposals 8 marks and 2 tackles. Needs to get those tackles up, but his disposal by foot was pretty good I thought.
Thought McStay butchered the ball, but his ability to win the footy was more concerning as bewick and c.beams had more marks and disposals then him. His disposal will improve but he needs to get it a lot more. He would be the one to go back( the 2s) for me. Maybe berry as well just to smash some neafl opponents and gain some confidence in his role

 

[PTizzle]

Think the knock on bewick and c.beams is a bit harsh.
Bewick had 18 disposals 7 marks and 4 tackles i would say a majority of those marks were intercepts.
C.beams had 17 disposals 8 marks and 2 tackles. Needs to get those tackles up, but his disposal by foot was pretty good I thought.
Thought McStay butchered the ball, but his ability to win the footy was more concerning as bewick and c.beams had more marks and disposals then him. His disposal will improve but he needs to get it a lot more. He would be the one to go back( the 2s) for me. Maybe berry as well just to smash some neafl opponents and gain some confidence in his role

Think those stats flatter them a little bit. I didn't think Claye was as bad as most seem to (but still had little to no impact) but Bewick was definitely very poor. Constantly fumbling, dropping chest marks, missing easy targets. He was working hard but was second to the ball like the majority of our team. 5 clangers from 18 touches as well. I'm a fan but he's nearly played 100 games, we have to start marking him harshly I think.

McStay would be the other one I'd single out too, just too many hero ball marking attempts and every single kick seemed to be a turnover. I'd also be letting one or two of the youngins having a spell in the reserves - they've had their moments but I think the way we've introduced them has led to an imbalance. Our forwardline desperately needs a bit of experience popped in there (and probably a bit of a shakeup with positioning re: Hipwood).

Was a disappointing game but mostly because of the 2016-esque feeling of the game being over after 10 minutes. The senior players were excellent, Mayes continues to be outstanding and grow in confidence and Gardiner had one of his best games. Robinson did extremely well on Martin as has been mentioned. I really liked Rich backing up a big game last weekend with another very strong showing while copping a tag too!

 

[Fitzroy bears]

Think those stats flatter them a little bit. I didn't think Claye was as bad as most seem to (but still had little to no impact) but Bewick was definitely very poor. Constantly fumbling, dropping chest marks, missing easy targets. He was working hard but was second to the ball like the majority of our team. 5 clangers from 18 touches as well. I'm a fan but he's nearly played 100 games, we have to start marking him harshly I think.

McStay would be the other one I'd single out too, just too many hero ball marking attempts and every single kick seemed to be a turnover. I'd also be letting one or two of the youngins having a spell in the reserves - they've had their moments but I think the way we've introduced them has led to an imbalance. Our forwardline desperately needs a bit of experience popped in there (and probably a bit of a shakeup with positioning re: Hipwood).

Was a disappointing game but mostly because of the 2016-esque feeling of the game being over after 10 minutes. The senior players were excellent, Mayes continues to be outstanding and grow in confidence and Gardiner had one of his best games. Robinson did extremely well on Martin as has been mentioned. I really liked Rich backing up a big game last weekend with another very strong showing while copping a tag too!

Couldn't agree more with marking him(bewick) harshly, but who do you bring in who will intercept mark, find the footy 18-20 times and dispose of the footy with 70%-80% accuracy. As far as I am aware we don't have a hodge, Mitchell, yoe in our 2's so we have to work with the players we do have imo.

 

[Bucking Beads]

Seemed like a fair chunk of our mid tier players had really poor games. The fumbles and dropped chest marks are always massive momentum killers. I'm actually disappointed with the coaching staffs lack of flexibility when it comes to Hipwood. Get the kid into the game a bit.

 

[Fitzroy bears]

Nothing wrong with holding guys to account but we need to be realistic in our expectations of them and think about who we replace them with if we want them dropped. Everyone in our 2's have deficiencies in their games, so what are we looking for in a game with our role players pressure, distribution, run etc... there is no one in our 2's who has everything so (edit) what choice do we have?

 

[dlanod]

Same crap since 2005. Building. Get smashed every week to the point where we're non competitive. Exodus at end of year. High draft picks. Talk a big game. Sell hope with a young list. Repeat.

Main difference is that now we're actually getting high draft picks (top 2 or 3) whereas previously we got picks 7 and later, excluding Leuey. Partly because of winning dead rubbers and partly because of the new team introductions.

 

[lioninthesand]

The Bombers are a much better footy side than we are.

Understand that, but they were coming off beating the Hawks so the 'that was a great effort' sentiment seemed applicable. But the last few weeks has shown that was a much more winnable game that we knew at the time.

 

[TheZork]

Haven't commented too much this season as it's obvious that Fagan is working his way through the list to work out who is worth persevering with and so ups and downs are to be expected.

Which brings me to last night. I was, was, in the camp that thought we were on the improve- gradual, granted, but discernible.

Not any more. We are where we were for the last few years. Nowhere. Absolutely nowhere. We have a group that is by and large never going to make it. Take out Beams D, Zorko, Martin, Robinson and what are we left with? Bugger all. By the time we have assembled a competitive side they'll all be long gone.

Put it another way- who is going to finish behind us this season. Realistically, Carlton is the only contender.

Take one example, but by no means the only one: I watched Bewick closely from the wing last night. Wherever he played, we had a soft spot. He was never going to be a hard, in and at it type, but he has gone backwards. Last season, to generally negative feedback, I said that whether or not Bewick was getting a game was a barometer of our team's progress. He is still getting a game. Same with that "team leader" Lester. And what about MacStay- what a revelation. Not.

TBH, with the above exceptions, you could go through the list with many of the same comments. But why bother. And what is it with dropping simple chest marks? Do we coach for this?

The only bright spot for me last night was Cox. Too light right now, but obviously great potential.

Very depressing.

Wrong.

On top of Beams, Zorko, Martin and Robinson we have Rockliff, Christensen, Rich, Andrews, Mayes and Gardiner who are all good footballers. That's 10 players. By the end of the season Cutler, Robertson and Taylor could all push to be put in that category of 'good' players who play their role well. Then you'd think that another 2-3 players step up in the preseason. That's 15-16 good players, it will take time but that is the reality of building a list, we should be playing finals in 2019. You and others need to stop being so negative, it is just one game. We have improved a lot since last year but will have some games where we look like the lions of 2016.

 

[matwt73]

Does it matter?

Yeah I think it does.

On this board there is a tendency towards very short memories. It leads to both perceptions that the sky is falling and to celebration of what turn out to be false dawns. It is often well to remind ourselves that not everything Keeps did was a miss and not everything Fagan tries will be an immediate hit.

As someone once said things are never...


On HTC 2PS6200 using BigFooty.com mobile app

 

[T Factor]

Nice "highlight" AFL website - nice offload rugby league style.

They were saying before the game that Rioli hasn't been beaten on a one on one this year, that was clearly incorrect disposal, so great work by Cox.

 

[Caiphus]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say the scoreboard flattered the tigers we only lost the inside 50 count by 9. They were way more efficient in their forward line then us and their back 6 only allowed 17 scoring shots from 51 entries. Could it just be that their forward line and backline were more experienced then us, not to mention one of our backline rebounders did a hamstring early in the game. I am buoyed by the fact we had 51 entries, in time our young forwards will convert those into scores. I am excited by the notion that with more pace in the middle of the ground will convert the dominance we had in clearances and hitouts into cleaner more direct forward thrusts and in turn more scores. The scoreboard does not reflect the ground this club has made on last year, but I can say this with certainty that there is no way we would have won the clearences last year, no way we would have had 51 forward entries and no way we would of smashed them in tackles 62-50. So cheer up people though the results may not come this year, the foundations are good and with a bit more pace in the mid and bit more muscle on our spine we will be good. We will be great in time.

This is what I was thinking too. Our midfield is functioning pretty well for the contested stuff we are just breaking down on our transition to both attacking and defensive positions. We have zero small defenders with defensive instincts, although our attack from the back line is getting there. I don't know where Schache is getting much criticism, he was working hard and leading well, sure he dropped some marks and missed some regulation set shots but he was presenting and offering movement compared to the largely static forward line otherwise. Hippy needs to get on his bike, sure he's a threat with low possessions but he has so much going for him athletically he should be using his strengths instead of giving the opportunity for his defender to push him under the ball. Even if we had crumbers there wasn't anything for them to crumb since our entries were largely being mopped up and then sent back over our heads because of a lack of defensive pressure.

I'm still seeing positives though. We were really competitive, Richmond were really good at stopping us from getting momentum and I think it was only once where we kicked three goals in a row but it felt like we might go on a run a couple of times before our heads dropped from simple skill errors. But we kept on turning up to crack in but when all your experienced quality is in the midfield we need too much luck going our way to generate consistency at either end.

 

[jackess]

I think we should keep Cox down back. Will hopefully help teach him the level of concentration required at AFL level.

 

[Tassie4ever]

Wrong.

On top of Beams, Zorko, Martin and Robinson we have Rockliff, Christensen, Rich, Andrews, Mayes and Gardiner who are all good footballers. That's 10 players. By the end of the season Cutler, Robertson and Taylor could all push to be put in that category of 'good' players who play their role well. Then you'd think that another 2-3 players step up in the preseason. That's 15-16 good player, it will take time but that is the reality of building a list, we should be playing finals in 2019. You and others need to stop being so negative, it is just one game. We have improved a lot since last year but will have some games where we look like the lions of 2016.

OK, I take your point/s. But, again, and I mean this seriously, please help me out. Who else are we going to beat this year? Maybe Carlton. Maybe. Then who else?

All the players you nominate were with us last season. Remind me- how many games did we win?

I think Cutler is capable of serious improvement, but that's about it.

I think we will take years to build- maybe 4 or 5 seasons at least. And this will need a strategic look at our recruitment processes because I think we get it wrong too often.

 

[jackess]

OK, I take your point/s. But, again, and I mean this seriously, please help me out. Who else are we going to beat this year? Maybe Carlton. Maybe. Then who else?

All the players you nominate were with us last season. Remind me- how many games did we win?

I think Cutler is capable of serious improvement, but that's about it.

I think we will take years to build- maybe 4 or 5 seasons at least. And this will need a strategic look at our recruitment processes because I think we get it wrong too often.

1. Nobody thought we'd finish above 16th or 17th.

2. Lots of shit went wrong last season. No idea what point you're trying to make.

3. We have an extremely young list with many capable of big improvements. We've already seen Mayes and Dizzy take their game to the next level. Andrews has shown quite a bit this year as well.

4. Nobody has thought otherwise.

 

[alscotoz2]

Excuse me?? Not sure which part of my post you've objected to. If it is the Beams part then I am sorry. He's got decent skills but has just never kicked on. His bodywork is terrible. Hipwood will be a star but right now he needs to be eating bulk food and putting on as much weight as possible so he can stop getting bumped off the ball.

I'm curious. Why would you apologise to someone who's just called you a dickhead?

On the game? We're still miles away but we knew we would be. Right?